Getting a glimpse of the real picture

A day in the life of Neil Crone

Celia Klemenz / Metroland

PORT PERRY -- A day in the life of Neil Crone, actor, writer and comic. Mr. Crone having brewed up a super-size latte, enjoyed the most important part of his day, time spent meditating and grounding on his back deck, shared with his dog, Owen. August 8, 2013

I have been fortunate enough to get away to a cabin up north for the past few days.

I have been even luckier in that the cabin has an enormous window fronting the frozen lake and wilderness beyond. No television in the world, no satellite or cable feed, no motion picture silver screen could possibly serve up the entertainment this window on the natural world has given me. I spend hours sitting, gazing out, watching story after story unfold. The sky alone is infinitely fascinating as it reveals, cloud by cloud, pastel shade by pastel shade, the mood of the evolving day.

There is enormous drama in simply observing the sun beginning to light the world. The expanse of the ice is so white and the edge of the advancing sunlight so crisp it feels as though we have been in a box all night and someone is slowly lifting the lid. At sunset the scene replays itself in magnificent reverse, the icy blue indigo of the winter night slowly cloaking the fading embers of the sun. We hear and use the word every day in a hundred inappropriate ways but this, truly, is awesome ... dude.

There is an equal amount of pleasure to be taken from the smaller, closer world outside the glass. I have heard that no two snowflakes are the same but it never occurred to me, until I sat and watched a squall play itself out, that there were so many different kinds of snow. From the downy, eyelash-coating variety to the angry, dangerous, I will bury you, kind. Mother Nature batting her eyes and baring her teeth in the same storm. It is breathtaking and terrifying in the same moment.

And, of course, there is, among the trees and drifts and deadfall, an entire world of flying, darting, scuttling creatures. Every one of which is fully engaged in a knife-edge struggle to survive as I sit, comfortably ensconced by the fire, sipping coffee laced with Baileys, my bare feet propped on the windowsill. Two hilariously animated red squirrels entertain my girlfriend Kathryn and me for hours as they scurry from cover to cover, frantically engaged in both seeking food and trying desperately not to be food. As much as we enjoy watching them, they seem to be fascinated by us too, occasionally popping out from beneath the cottage onto the drifts directly in front of our window and staring, a comical look of both WTF and OMG on their twitching, whiskered faces.

These encounters are short-lived however; we barely get to say hi before an ominously circling shadow, twitching branch or the wet noses of the dogs pressed to the window sends them hysterically off to the nearest shelter; frenzied, furry commuters late for a train.

I’m not certain why this window and its show are so appealing. I can and do sit and watch the world occasionally at home. The allure, I think, lies in a matter of scale. The world outside the cabin seems vast, wild, even dangerous. At home everything seems tamer, more orderly, understandable. And the sky never seems as boldly huge as it does over a frozen lake. It makes me feel small. And in a world where so much of our time and effort is spent in trying to make ourselves, homes and bank accounts larger ... there is a kind of relief in seeing the real picture now and then.

-- Durham resident Neil Crone, actor, comic, writer, saves some of his best lines for this column.